Sydney Uni Follows Code Banning Contraception & IVF For Gays

Newsroom

Posted on August 11, 2016
by Deirdre Fogarty

Teachers at Notre Dame University’s School of Medicine are required to follow a code of standards which takes a hard-line against contraception, abortion and IVF for gay couples, The Australian reports.

The school demands its medical lecturers commit “to teaching in the context of the Code of Ethical Standards for Catholic Health and Aged Care Services in Australia” – a code of standards which describes abortion as “the deliberate killing of an innocent human life”.

It also blanket bans contraception, seeks to refuse IVF treatments for gay and unmarried couples and advises against prenatal testing; it claims the latter is unnecessary as abortion is not permitted even in the case of “abnormalities”.

The code states that the use of contraception deprives “the marital act of its procreative potential… temporarily or permanently” and is therefore “not permissible”, while taking the stance that abortion is “morally wrong because [it] involves the direct and deliberate killing of an innocent human life in the earliest stages of development”.

The types of fertility treatments permitted for married couples are also outlined – although IVF is banned outright for acting as a substitute for the “marital act” – and it is found to be within a facility’s rights to refuse services to gay couples.

Notre Dame University has campuses in Fremantle, Broome and Sydney; while a Catholic facility, it does receive government funding.

Christine Bennett, the school dean, insisted that the code of standards does not affect the medical students’ curriculum, saying that “the medicine students gain a comprehensive medical education covering all aspects of contemporary medicine.”

According to the university’s website, most of their degree programmes “incorporate relevant material derived from centuries of Catholic academic thinking (in healthcare…)”, which the school claims reflects “the richness of Catholic thought and practice.”